Who needs to watch the debate when even the liberals say Romney won?

I was aboard ship (more on that later) and then on the phone boasting about having been aboard ship, so I missed the debate. I’m sure I’ll watch bits and pieces of it on the internet at some later date but, frankly, why bother? The broad consensus is that Romney won. This isn’t the broad consensus amongst optimists on the right. Nooo. It’s the broad consensus amongst deeply depressed Progressives. In lieu of the spin we expected, we hear the sound of Progressive dreams shattering. Simply put, Romney dominated the evening, and that despite Jim Lehrer’s usual weak showing.

I’m still not counting my chickens. This was just one debate. It’s worth remembering that, in 1984, Ronald Reagan, who was probably one of the most gifted debaters of modern times, had an absolutely dreadful debate showing against Mondale. He still managed to pull his chestnuts out of the fire, and Obama may do the same. Obama’s problem, though, is that he isn’t as gifted as Reagan and that he doesn’t have Reagan’s track record. Those two hurdles are going to be hard for him to overcome.

What do you think? Since I assume most of you actually watched the debate, I’m very interested in your insights.

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I in fact didn’t watch it. Born in New York, 6 years of school in Boston – I watched the Yankees metagrobalize the Red Sox, 14-2. Very satisfying! The only thing that’s a bit of a worry is that it took them until the absolute last game of the season to sew up the AL East. They should have had that wrapped up three weeks ago, it shouldn’t have taken until tonight.

Romney-Jugears? Absolutely no need to expend my eyeballs on that, I knew how I’m voting.

PaulScott

I watched standing against a pillar in crowded room of hard core Dems. We were pretty jazzed over all, but I think most gave Romney plenty of credit for his effort. I’ll certainly cop to that. On the other hand, Obama was his steady, slightly halting self. His thoughtful comments showed the depth of his conviction – from my perspective. I know you’ll disagree.

But that’s kind of the point. You guys will read Romney’s words quite differently from us. We heard Romney and still consider him to be a pawn of industry with no plan he’s willing to discuss in detail. It’s so clear to us that’s the case.

You, of course, see Obama as incompetent, or worse, conniving. The only question is how it plays to those really weird people who haven’t already made up their minds. I mean, really, how can you not be one way or the other?

JKB

I popped in and out. Not only was Romney well versed on the topics, he really pushed the two visions of America and the need to streamline regulation.

But have you heard? The moderators of the other debates were whisked away to an undisclosed location complete with Rocky music to do comeback training with emphasis on protecting the Obama.

I think that will be the real draw for the rest of the debates. The MSM moderators making fools of themselves trying to protect Obama. Or, may we see the MSM start to drift away from Obama in hopes of survival?

SADIE

“I don’t know what he was doing out there, he had his head down, he was enduring the debate rather than fighting it,” said Matthews. Matthews then said, “Where was Obama tonight?…We have our knives out, we go after the people with the facts. What was he doing tonight? He went in there disarmed. He was like, oh wait, an hour and a half, I think I can get through this thing and I don’t even look at this guy whereas Romney, I love the split screen. Staring at Obama, addressing him, like the prey. He did it just right. I’m coming at an incumbent, I’ve got to beat him, you’ve got to beat the champ. And I’m going to beat him tonight. And I don’t care what this moderator, whatever he thinks he is, because i’m going to ignore him. What was Romney doing? He was winning…five more of these nights, forget it!”

I won’t have time to watch the debate until Saturday morning. But the Left is very disappointed, from what I’m reading.

They should not have been surprised. Obama’s been mailing it as President for the last two years. He played golf rather than attend security briefings and do all the other many myriad tasks that a President must do – couldn’t be bothered. The “I’d rather be playing golf” mentality certainly seemed to be in effect, from what I read. That mentality – across his Administration – led to debacles and death in our Egypt and Libya embassies, which is horrifying. To lead to a poor debate performance is not as serious, but it is at least telling.

I’m looking forward to watching the debate.

The hard-core leftist commentary on the debate is that they agreed with Obama on nearly all of his data points, but that he presented them in a meandering, confused, muddled mess. That he was disengaged and appeared to think he shouldn’t have to BE there, that he is above such things. And one leftie commentator even said that by the end of the debate Obama was coming across as *bitter*. Wow! Obama shows his true face as the mask falls.

Since I haven’t watched the debate yet, I have no business commenting, really. I can only comment on the commentary. But it certainly appears Obama has been coasting for a loooong time in his protective cocoon. Mailing it in on many levels. Now he’s going to have to pivot and become energized and quick and appear as if he is complete command of his job when he isn’t. He’s going to have to rat-a-tat-tat like machine-gun fire in the next debate, and with passion and energy. That kind of a turn-around is possible if Obama approaches the next debate as a 1.5 hour piece of deceitful performance art in which he pretends to give a damn what Americans think of him.

Michael Adams

I only watched a little bit of it. I am a pretty empathetic guy, nurse, Daddy, grandpa, and so on, so I could only watch about fifteen minutes. I have utter contempt for Obama, but last night I had a little pity. Still, the part that sent me to bed early was Obama standing there and flat lying. He did it over and over in those first fifteen minutes. He said Romney wanted a five trillion dollar tax cut, said it several times, and Romney just said “That is inaccurate.” I wanted to scream at the television, “You lie!” Hugh Hewitt’s piece about how to tell when O’guy’s lying was so funny, and yet, he did not get the half of it. The tells just leapt out at us.

Jim Lehrer was prompting the O’Guy, and he still stumbled like a drunk.That’s all in the first fifteen minutes. I hope the debates can help.

Gringo

PaulScottThe only question is how it plays to those really weird people who haven’t already made up their minds.
One indication may be the CNN poll, which had Romney winning the debate 67-25.

I mean, really, how can you not be one way or the other?
I would tend to agree with you there. The evidence is in. Then there is an “undecided” like Ann Althouse, the law professor cum blogger, who recently wrote that she was “undecided.” That lead many to the conclusion that she has been writing on her blog not to express her heartfelt convictions, but to increase traffic to her blog.

But judging from comments here and in my local paper, etc., there were two debates last night, so I’m going to have to find both of them to find out what all really happened.

Earl T

On the other hand, Obama was his steady, slightly halting self. His thoughtful comments showed the depth of his conviction – from my perspective. I know you’ll disagree. PaulScott Surely, you jest! “…steady”? Barack Hussein looked like he was run over by the bus he throws his people under. That was pure “deer in the headlights” to anyone with two working brain cells. Staring down all night, rushing off the platform after the debate, leg lifted during the debate, asking Lehrer to move on to the next topic…all signs of a whipped cur, at best! Even Axeldouche himself, admits as much this AM. And Tingles Mathews suffered a complete meltdown. The vid of his act was exhilerating to watch for this Conservative. So, does standing/watching in a room full of hard core Dems really cloud reality as much as you portray? Now your precious pollsters are going have to sample D+20 to make this race even. LOL!

SADIE

Al Gore has uncovered the reason for Obama’s debacle. It was the altitute! Wheww..glad Al cleared that up for all of us. Silly me thinking Obama’s attitute was the problem.

“Obama arrived in Denver at 2 p.m. today — just a few hours before the debate started,” Gore said on his network, Current. “Romney did his debate prep in Denver. When you go to 5,000 feet, and you only have a few hours to adjust, I don’t know…”

Charles Martel

How is it I suspect that most of the people in the room PaulScott was standing in would choose “loving husband” over “lying eyes” in the old anecdote about the wife who catches her spouse in flagrante delicto with the babysitter on the couch?

It’s quite obvious the Obama loyalists like Paul Scott tie their social and economic status to the Leftist alliance. To them, it is better to own the businesses than to be a pawn of them. And their idea of ownership can be readily seen in Obama’s GM and confiscation of Republican business client lists to give to Democrat dealerships. That is their Utopia and if people think an election will prevent its coming, just how long will it be before people realize that the chances of that goes down every year the Left’s back is not broken?

Ron19

Maybe Obama should have just stopped taking questins and declared himself The Winner.

Gringo

Sadie:Al Gore has uncovered the reason for Obama’s debacle. It was the altitute! Wheww..glad Al cleared that up for all of us.

It is rather fitting that Al Gore is the author of The Assault on Reason. 🙂

Some professional athletes maintain that there is an altitude disadvantage in visiting Denver, The Mile High City. Perhaps there is, but it is hard to imagine there is an altitude disadvantage for talking.

Visitors who imbibe alcoholic beverages at high altitudes find out there is a definite altitude disadvantage for getting drunk. I have heard stories of horrible hangovers at 12,000 feet in La Paz, Bolivia. I experienced the worst hangover in my life at 9,000 feet in Sucre Bolivia. As a passerby on the street, I got invited to a wedding fest, and imbibed more than my fair share of chicha. I went to bed at 8 p.m. and woke up 20 hours later. Fortunately, there was no headache involved- just enough fatigue to sleep 20 hours.

SADIE

Gringo, I have a terrible fear of heights. I tried conquering them at Tikal, Guatamala. I did manage to see the jungle by climbing a series of ladders nailed to trees and little winding foot paths and more ladders until I could reach the top and hug the closet rock I could find. All photos of me show a woman, who was whiter than a sheet looking like a deer in highlights. Had the still photos been on video, you would have seen trembling lips and some minor twitching, too. Of course, I’ll never know if the twitching was due to nerves or the billion mosquites in search of a meal of O-positive blood. Back to Al, ever so briefly. It’s not that I didn’t know that he’s a jerk. That was obvious long before his descent into globull-warming-land. It was just a horrible flashback to his candidacy. I often wondered to myself when SCOTUS gathered, did they say it aloud or to themselves, “WTF” this man can never be the president – he’s nuts.

Charles Martel

Am I the only person who thinks that Al Gore and Prince Charles were separated at birth?

Ron19

Romney debated Obama and responded to his challenges right there and then.

Obama’s responses to Romney sounded like they were pre-recorded, that he wasn’t really listening to Romney except to select a script to read from. It was like he was still reading from a teleprompter, although the teleprompter head moves were missing.

Romney looked straight at who he was supposed to be talking or listening to. Except for a few minutes of straining to look directly at the camera, when Obama was talking to Romney or Lehrer he mostly turned his head partway toward them, then shifted his eyes the rest of the way over to looking directly at someone. Much of it looked like a jailyard private discussion.

I’m deliberatly not commenting on the substance behind their words; there are others who do that better than I can. As others have done here, you can take your own spin on what they actually said.

I’m looking forward to the VP Debate.

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